John Randolph Tucker (December 24, 1823 – February 13, 1897) was an American lawyer, author, and politician from Virginia. From a distinguished family, he was elected Virginia's attorney general in 1857 and after re-election served during the American Civil War (James S. Wheat served as attorney general in Union-held portions of the state). After a pardon and Congressional Reconstruction, Tucker was elected as U.S. Congressman (1875-1887), and later served as the first dean of the Washington and Lee University Law School. Early life and family Tucker was born in Winchester, Virginia on Christmas Eve in 1823, the son of Anna Evalina Hunter Tucker (1789-1855) and her husband Judge Henry St. George Tucker (1780-1848). A grandson of St. George Tucker, J.R. Tucker would become proud of his heritage among the First Families of Virginia. His father and many relatives owned plantations and enslaved persons. Nonetheless, several of his siblings never reached adulthood. His brothers Dr. Alfred Bland Tucker (1830-1862) and Lt.Col. St. George Hunter Tucker (1828-1863) would die of consumption while in the Confederate States Army; his brother Dr. David Hunter Tucker (1815-1871) became a professor at three medical schools including the Medical College of Virginia and survived his Confederate service. His brother Nathaniel Beverley Tucker (1820-1890) would become a Confederate diplomat and later a journalist. John Randolph Tucker attended a private school near his Winchester home, then entered the Richmond Academy. He finished his studies at the University of Virginia, graduating with a legal degree in 1844. He married Laura Powell in 1848. They had one son who survived to adulthood, Henry St. George Tucker, III (who later became a U.S. Congressman). Their daughters who married well and survived their parents included: Anne Holmes Tucker McGuire (1850 - 1914), Gertrude Tucker Logan (1856 - 1925), and Laura Randolph Tucker Pendleton (1860 - 1946). Early legal and political career John Randolph Tucker was admitted to the Virginia bar in 1845, and began a private legal practice in Winchester. In 1854 he delivered a major speech to the literary societies at College of William and Mary which argued that slavery was consistent with republicanism. He also became active in politics and was a presidential elector on the Democratic ticket in 1852 and 1856. American Civil War Voters elected Tucker Attorney General of the Commonwealth of Virginia in 1857, and he served during the American Civil War, until the Commonwealth surrendered to Union